


Eat The Morphed

by Mendicantelle



Category: Hannibal (TV), Power Rangers, Power Rangers Dino Charge
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Violence, Cannibalism, Character Death, Crack, Crack Crossover, Crack Treated Seriously, Culture Shock, Dino Super Charge, Empathy, Enemies to Friends, Established Relationship, Established Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter, Gen, Hannibal Loves Will, Hannibal is Hannibal, Hannibal is a Cannibal, Heckyl needs a hug, I'm Going to Hell, M/M, Meta, Monsters, Multi, Murder Husbands, On the Run, Possessive Hannibal, Protective Hannibal Lecter, Protective Will, Psychotherapy, Ranger Death, Ravenstag, Reality Bending, The Author Regrets Nothing, Wendigo Hannibal, What Have I Done, Will Loves Hannibal, concussion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-19
Updated: 2018-01-21
Packaged: 2018-12-17 09:52:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 10,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11849106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mendicantelle/pseuds/Mendicantelle
Summary: There are moments so artistically perfect that time seems to stop, and one of them is the moment where Will Graham drops to the ground, the dark spray of his blood describing a perfect parabola in the air. There is so much beauty in the scene that it gives Hannibal pause: the perfect clarity of the sky, the reaching fingers of the tree branches, the slow arc of Will’s body as he falls.It is a scene completely unbalanced by the neon ugliness of the Rangers.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> #I'mgoingtohellforthis  
> For those Hannibal fans who are curious, this is Heckyl: http://powerrangers.wikia.com/wiki/Heckyl  
> Particularly for most recent chapters, please take your warnings from the tags.

“Will. Will.”

  
Usually Hannibal doesn’t have to speak more than once, or for that matter raise his voice, to get his partner’s attention. But Will is deep in a folder of press clippings, poring over even the smallest details, his eyes dissecting the grainy images down to their very pixels. He doesn’t look up until Hannibal places a hand gently on his shoulder.

  
“Will. The new patient will be here shortly.”

  
“Oh. Right.”

  
Will starts scuffling his papers together, swiping the photo pages and his own notes into the foolscap file. These days, their living space is more limited, and Hannibal sees the clients in the living room at the big rosewood dining table because it is the most impressive furniture they have. Sometimes, if he is feeling so inclined, he even serves them snacks in the little bone china bowls Will picked up at the market the first time they went into town.  
It is important that Hannibal has clients, because clients have money and money is also limited: hiding out from the authorities in New Zealand and staying successfully hidden means that many of Hannibal’s money stashes are lost to them. However, finding the right clients is also important. Clients who don’t talk carelessly. Clients who also have a vested interest in staying under the radar. There are more of these than one would think. Rich ex-pats who became both rich and ex-pat by less than legal means. People taking advantage of the wide open spaces of the antipodes to get themselves comprehensively lost forever.

  
“I would like you to experience this patient,” says Hannibal, as Will straightens from dumping his folder into a drawer and is about to leave the room. Will raises an eyebrow. This doesn’t happen. Hannibal practically chases him out when clients come. The less Will knows, the less danger he is in, and Hannibal is obsessive to the point of lethal about Will being safe.

“So you’re either considering inviting them to dinner or you think you may make a new friend. Which is it?”

  
Hannibal’s inscrutable face gives nothing away. Knowing from long experience that he’ll get nothing more, Will brushes his hand briefly, in passing, and slips into the cubby by the bookshelves. Sitting there, he is screened by the woven rush room divider, and the back of Hannibal’s beautiful but battered Queen Anne leather wing-chair: to those seated at the table, he is invisible. He settles into a slouchy Buddha pose, clutching the worn burgundy velvet cushion into his lap in lieu of the dog he has not managed to convince Hannibal to get, and waits.

For a change, Hannibal is not being deliberately evasive. He is not sure about this new patient. Not even eighty percent sure, and that is concerning. Still, all his usual safeguards had turned up nothing. None of his alerts, either external or internal, had been triggered by either his conversations with the man on the telephone or his internet searches.  
But there is something…off…about this client that he finds it hard to place. He is almost certain, however, that a initial consultation will clear up any lingering confusion.

  
Almost.

  
The man is neither early, nor late. He is precisely on time and Hannibal does not hear a car driving away. Their home is distant from Amber Beach by several miles. A walk-in client is unusual, but certainly not impossible, should the client be relatively fit.  
He’s also wearing the most glorious suit. Hannibal doesn’t do impressed, but if he did, it would look a lot like this. The man in the dark suit is young, at least half Hannibal’s age, slender and elegant, carries himself like he’s confident of his place in the world. When Hannibal comes to the door, he’s just tucking a pocket watch back into his vest, and the flash of bright teal hair running asymmetrically back from his brow almost seems to glow as he lifts his head to meet his new doctor’s eyes. There’s a curl of identical teal vanishing down the skin of his neck into his collar.

  
“Mr Heckyl,” says Hannibal, smiling politely but formally. “Right on time I see. Please come in.”

  
“Thank you,” Heckyl responds. His voice is a light tenor drawl, very New Zealand, very beach folk. If not a local, then at least a second-generation immigrant. Heckyl is by no means a local name, although it is possibly a pseudonym. He offers his hand and the man takes it immediately.

  
And there is…a moment. Somewhere in Hannibal’s consciousness, the dark antlered figure of the wendigo raises its head and makes a guttural sound of challenge. And something hulking and armoured and inhuman lounging in Heckyl’s shadow laughs back.

  
Now that is interesting. Hannibal releases the hand, gestures, still smiling. Heckyl slips past Hannibal’s arm and walks down the little hall, following Hannibal’s indicated direction, until he enters the living room.  
“Please, take a seat,” Hannibal says. His client obliges, folding himself into the chair as if it were a king’s throne. Or perhaps a general’s command chair, Hannibal corrects himself. Yes. This one has the taste of strategy and Machiavelli’s prince about him. He settles into his own chair with a quiet, internal satisfaction, because there are so few genuinely interesting people in the world and Mr Heckyl is definitely shaping up to be one of them, with his good formal suit and casual world-crushing demeanour. They sit and evaluate each other for a long moment, Hannibal’s dark eyes against Heckyl’s blue, and then Hannibal says:

  
“You didn’t indicate on the telephone if there was anything particular you needed to discuss.”

  
It’s not his usual opener, but he will admit to a little more than his usual curiosity. And he knows that Will, hidden in his corner, will recognise that, and pay closer attention. Heckyl opens his mouth as if to reply, then shuts it again - and finally, with a flicking gesture of his hand, says:

  
“I think we can be straight with each other, can’t we? Doctor Lecter? Also known as ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’? Hm?”

  
The shadow wendigo stirs and coils to spring behind Hannibal’s eyes. The laughter of the new patient’s own shadow creature echoes in the moment. He says nothing, and Heckyl smiles like a shark into the silence.

  
“You see, Doctor - may I call you Hannibal? - there’s someone I’d like you to eat.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Will wants to be sick at the very sensation. The wrongness of it rises in his throat like bile. He is gripped by the sudden uncertainty about whether the patient knows: it is possible this is a form of schizophrenia, hiding the monster under the human face. He needs to see him to be sure. He wants to see him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no explanation for this and I'm definitely still going to hell.

Will has found it difficult not to make a sound since the new patient entered the house.

Part of him wants to stand up. To reveal himself. To growl like a dog, raise his hackles, show the newcomer that he and Hannibal are not to be trifled with.

Another part of him wants to hide under the table from the inevitable storm that he can feel is lurking oppressively over their home.

There is something wrong with this man. Now he understands why Hannibal wanted him to be here. Will’s sensitivity to Hannibal’s own darkness has often proved to be an unwelcome burden, but right now the flighty animal of his own subconscious is alert and awake to a new danger. He knows predators. He has made a study of them. They have lived inside his head, and some of them live there still, despite his best efforts to subdue them.  Even they are wary of this patient, in the way coyotes are wary when wolves are about.

There is. Something. Wrong. With this man.

Wanting to fidget in anxiety, he instead clutches the cushion to his chest and tries to stay still as Hannibal invites this…this _apex predator_ into their home. He can hear in Hannibal’s flat courtesy that the doctor is also being cautious.

Scrape of chairs as they sit down at the table. Will lifts his head very gingerly. The familiar expensive scent of Hannibal’s cologne, the fabric of his suits. And now, colouring the room, the newcomer’s scent. Something bright and sharp and alien -

 

“You didn’t indicate on the telephone if there was anything particular you needed to discuss.”

 

Red flag in Will’s book. This is not how Hannibal operates. He lets his clients begin. Uses their first stumbling words to form the basis of his diagnosis and treatment. But Hannibal is curious. Will wonders, if like a cat, Hannibal is due to be slain by his curiosity. The patient’s reply confirms his worst fears.

“I think we can be straight with each other, can’t we? Doctor Lecter? Also known as ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’? Hm?”

Inside Will’s head something with antlers lowers its head in warning. 

“You see, Doctor - may I call you Hannibal? - there’s someone I’d like you to eat.”

 

Will’s heart almost stops. He doesn’t breathe. This is it. It’s over.

They will have to move. Now. Today. Hannibal must kill this man, find out what he knows, who he knows.

Although it’s not something Will can admit to himself fully, he would kill to keep Hannibal safe. What he can admit without a qualm is that the man in this room, the man who holds their safety in the balance, frightens him. He doesn’t need a murder scene to walk in order to get a feel of this one’s design.

This one is a murderer on a scale unprecedented. Unprecedented even to Will, who sleeps in the same bed as a cannibal serial killer. There’s so much death dragging behind this one that the air tastes sharp and rotten with it.

And worst of all, there’s a monster at the man’s heart, goading him, driving him - sometimes consuming him.

Will wants to be sick at the very sensation. The wrongness of it rises in his throat like bile. He is gripped by the sudden uncertainty about whether the patient knows: it is possible this is a form of schizophrenia, hiding the monster under the human face.  He needs to see him to be sure. He _wants_ to see him.

He hears Hannibal’s quiet reply without really taking it in.

“I am flattered you have selected a delicacy for my table, Mr Heckyl, but I am not a beast to be brought to the slaughterhouse. I do not deliver _haute cuisine_ on demand.”

“Oh, no no no, not at _all_ ,” Heckyl says, sounding genuinely outraged. The very _idea_. There’s something almost British-Victorian about his delivery, a self-conscious sort of mannered politeness that doesn’t belong to this century. Will digs his fingernails into his own palms, holding himself still. “I am offering you a unique opportunity. A taste sensation, if you will. Something akin to eating, say, a unicorn. Or a fairy.”

Will doesn’t need to see Hannibal’s face to know that he is nodding, inscrutably polite in the face of this situation which could throw their world upside-down.

“Suppose you were to enlighten me.”

Heckyl laughs in pure delight. Will’s skin crawls. Again, the nagging sensation that it’s not one patient sitting at their table, but two patients in one body.

“A special kind of human being,” the patient says. “One with…shall we say…an ancient flavour.”

Hannibal is quiet.

“And why would you bring this…ancient unicorn to me?”

“Let’s say it’s a mutually beneficial opportunity,” Heckyl replies smoothly. “I’ll be honest with you, your being here is a fortunate accident, but I will always use all possible advantages at my disposal. Particularly intelligent ones. Good, intelligent help is apparently _so_ hard to find.”

Will coils with anger in his chair at this cavalier attitude. Treating Hannibal like a resource to be mined, a tool to be exploited. It’s inappropriate and unbearable.

The relief is immense when Hannibal, not bothering to raise his voice, says:

“Will.”

It’s an unmistakeable summons. So Will emerges, to see the new monster for the first time.

My god, he’s so _young_. He looks like a kid playing steampunk.

Then Heckyl meets his eyes and there’s something unfathomably ancient and awful in there and Will almost takes a step close, almost raises his hand to brush against the man’s face, because _oh god_ he reminds him of Hannibal in the strangest way and there’s just _something_ -

“ _Will_.” Hannibal’s voice is gently chiding, but with that edge of possessiveness that spells danger, and Will snaps out of it. Heckyl has dropped his gaze and is looking at his own shoes as if embarrassed.

“This is my good friend Will Graham,” says Hannibal, as blithely as if he’s just turned up at a garden party with an unannounced plus one. Heckyl still doesn’t look up. His hand has wandered shakily to the curls of teal tattoo emerging from his collar, and he’s trembling as if with some terrible effort. Only slightly, but to Will, whose ability to observe minutiae is unparalleled, it’s a huge and alarming symptom of something far worse. He darts a glance at Hannibal, wanting to warn him, but Hannibal’s instincts are way ahead of him.

“Are you feeling quite well?”

Heckyl is almost panting now, struggling to get his breathing under control, and to Will the room feels like those moments before a storm breaks: unbearably heavy and oppressive. But after twenty seconds or so he masters it, and straightens in his chair, only the fleeting frantic glance he throws at Will betraying his discomposure.

“So,” he says, and offers a lopsided, ghastly smile that makes Will want to put him in a hospital, “have you ever heard of the Power Rangers?”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He hasn't underestimated Hannibal Lecter, however. The dino-sprogs information doesn't faze him. The mention of "chargers" and "skin-tight jumpsuits" and "giant transforming robots" barely gains him a flicker of eyebrow. The man Will, on the other hand, is now starting to look at him with a huge, overbearing sorrow and sympathy, as if he too knows what it is to sound as if your best option is a padded room and medication for life.

The pain in Heckyl's head is immense: what he can't understand is why the second man (Will) is looking at him with such a peculiar mix of horror and empathy. It seems Snide doesn't take kindly to being supplanted. Either that, or his discomfort at being in the same room as this superior form of monster is making it harder to keep him locked away inside.   
The pocket watch inside his vest feels like it's burning, vibrating, a leaden weight.   
He may have gasped. He isn't sure. The pressure is unbearable and yet he will bear it, he has to, he has borne the unbearable so many times before and come out alive.   
Not sane perhaps, but alive.   
He hopes his eyes aren't bleeding again. Because it's hard enough to be taken seriously when talking about super-powered candy-coloured teenagers with techno-dinosaurs, let alone if you're also looking like you should be wearing a straitjacket.   
He hasn't underestimated Hannibal Lecter, however. The dino-sprogs information doesn't faze him. The mention of "chargers" and "skin-tight jumpsuits" and "giant transforming robots" barely gains him a flicker of eyebrow. The man Will, on the other hand, is now starting to look at him with a huge, overbearing sorrow and sympathy, as if he too knows what it is to sound as if your best option is a padded room and medication for life.   
  
Heckyl's plan runs thus: he is a wielder of monsters. A good one, too, because he carries the biggest monster of all inside him. He's noticed, though, that his track record of success is somewhat embarrassing, and it hasn't escaped his notice either that much of this can be laid squarely at the feet of the parade of carnival b-movie freaks he has at his disposal.   
Sledge had been an idiot, to be sure, but he'd had one good idea. Find a monster that looks human to fight the Rangers. A clever monster. One who can blend in.   
Because let's face it, blending in when you look like the bastard offspring of a 50's Godzilla costume, a crazy-golf mascot and a soda vending machine is not the easiest of jobs. Humans are stupid, but they're not blind. Sure, they had powers. Magic, as this world would see it. But what they didn't have was any form of subtlety or finesse.   
Dr Lecter, in stark contrast, is a study in elegant monstrosity, hidden beautifully in his impeccable suit and seemingly unflappable calm. He is perfect. And his record of successful kills is impressive.   
Just the kind of man who could bring a world to its knees when it was looking the other way.   
Hannibal laces his fingers loosely on the table and says: "This is all very interesting." And there's absolutely nothing Heckyl can assume from that, the tone is so ambiguous.   
"Did I mention one of them is a caveman?" Heckyl pursues. "A real, genuine caveman. Paleo diet. I'm sure the taste would be intriguing and unique, not to mention the challenge of the hunt. Just - "and he leans forward, ignoring the screaming agony in his head, wags a cheery finger - "I wouldn't re-freeze the leftovers. Pre-frozen goods, if you see what I mean."

  
There is the tiniest flicker of amusement at the edge of Hannibal's lips. _Got him,_ Heckyl thinks, but then Hannibal ruins his triumph by shaking his head. 

  
"You have done enough research to locate me, which in itself is admirable. However, my statement remains. I am not your sword - or filleting knife - for hire." He leans back in his chair, a position of supreme unconcern and dismissal. "Would you like to continue your therapy session now? I feel there is a great deal you would benefit from discussing in more detail."

  
Heckyl swallows hard against the inevitable and somewhat smug backlash of pain from Snide. Snide takes every percieved failure on Heckyl's part as a victory for himself. 

  
"Thank you for your time, Doctor," he manages, his eyes narrowing against the awful pressure. "And I'd like to say now that I offered an alliance first. I did not press the issue."

  
From outside, the sound of running feet. Shouts. Will Graham sits up in his chair, alert, eyes wide like a deer in the headlights.   
"However," Heckyl continues, trying not to show how close he is to passing out with the effort of restraining his transformation into the monster he despises, "I feel the issue is about to press itself."  
And with that, his body twists in a spasmodic arch: his fingers scrabble helplessly at the tattoo at his throat. It's glowing with an unhealthy, unearthly light. Time's up. The monster won't hold back anymore.   
  
There's a big difference between listening to someone tell you about primary-coloured ninjas in novelty motorcycle helmets and actually seeing them, as it turns out.   
Sat at Hannibal's table, it was a fairytale. A madman's fancy. Something that Will could comfortably keep at arm's length. He likes stories. What he doesn't like is harsh reality, particularly if it comes wrapped in dayglo spandex.   
It's offensive on some deep instinctual level to his sensibilities, and if he's feeling like this, who knows what the sight of six Power Rangers advancing on his cabin is doing to Hannibal. It's like an acid rainbow trip impossibility in their muted, dark little world.   
It's  _ugly_.   
And the man who's brought this ugliness down upon them has just collapsed onto the floor, looking like he's having a seizure. Everything about this situation is wrong, not even counting the dinosaur robot element.   
"Hannibal, go," Will says. "We'll meet up later. I remember where, the car's just out front. I'll take it."  
Hannibal isn't going. Will presses, coming close to him, gripping his arm and feeling the tension in the muscles beneath the suit.   
"I'll take him out the front. Leave him for them, from what he's said it's probably him they're after. Please go."  
The unspoken _I'll take him out and slit his throat_  hangs between them. People who find out who Hannibal is have to die. It's the only thing that's kept them safe. Will reaches down, scruffs the writhing figure of Heckyl and starts dragging him toward the front door. He senses more than sees Hannibal finally moving behind him. Good.   
And it all would have gone perfectly to plan (the knife is already in Will's hand) had not the slender man in his grip suddenly turned into some kind of armoured tank. Will, his arm suddenly dragged down by the extra weight, stumbles.   
This is impossible.   
Still, the fact that it's impossible seems almost irrelevant right now, because the pack of achingly bright-coloured people standing on the patch of cleared ground that serves as his and Hannibal's front lawn seem focused on attacking as soon as the armoured monster at Will's feet lurches to his feet.   
  
"It's Snide!"  
"Time to stop him!"  
"Yeah! Let's do this!"  
  
 _Are they always this cheerful?_  Will wonders, as the monster - Snide - rumbles out a totally stereotypical evil-villain laugh and draws a sword from apparently nowhere. If this is the dark side to the slim young man from earlier, Will decides he actually finds the human shape more threatening. This...this is so ridiculous it's almost funny.   
Except that the Rangers are all attacking, in formation like the world's most vindictive cheerleading squad.   
And they're coming straight for him. They've obviously decided that he's guilty by association. One of them, the one in red, kicks the blade from his hand almost effortlessly, and spins on one foot, aiming for Will's head.   
"Wait!" Will starts, but it's far too late. The blow lands, and Will's head snaps painfully to one side, blood spilling from his nose and mouth in a delicate stream. Falling, his gaze hits on a familiar approaching shadow in the periphery.   
Hannibal is coming around the porch with his considerable shoulders up in that expression of horrible controlled anger that Will knows so well. He is evidently not pleased by this turn of events.    
  
And he's just seen Will fall to the ground, bleeding.   
  
 _Well...shit,_  thinks Will, and tries not to completely lose consciousness. 

  
He fails.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So logically, Hannibal is safe and has come out on top in the confrontation, as is often the case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm updating the tags because...yeah, this chapter. If you don't want to see Ranger death, don't read this.

The next thing Will knows is quiet, and the taste of his own blood.   
He doesn't sit up. He knows better than that after the encephalitis. When your head feels like bits may fall off, wheeling, into space if you so much as blink, sitting up is best saved for later. The blood is tacky and uncomfortable in his stubble, the smell of it clogging his nose and the metallic thickness at the back of his throat confirming that he's swallowed a great deal more than he'd have liked. 

He is indoors again, in his own home. He has been laid on the rug before the mantelpiece, and covered with Hannibal's grey check jacket, the light wool one. He knows all this without having to open his eyes, because the smell and sensations around him are familiar. He has lain on this rug before, under happier circumstances, and the light, expensive scent of the wool impregnated with Hannibal's cologne is unmistakable. 

Will stretches out his arm, fingers running through the pile of the rug, and stops when those fingers hit something else, something soft and yielding and far too warm. Someone's face. 

Still not risking the light in his eyes, Will explores the face with careful fingertips. Male, he thinks. Soft, clean-shaven. When his hand reaches the collar and throat and discovers the lenses of what can only be goggles hanging there like a necklace across a pinned cravat, he realises who it is. Heckyl. Their visitor. There's a pulse in the throat, beating strongly ( _but so fast, my god, how fast, inhumanly fast_ ) and breaths lifting the chest, so he's alive.

There are no other sounds evident in the house. Where is Hannibal? The idea that the intruding Rangers may have taken him is unbearable, but he hopes unlikely. Somebody has brought him here, covered him with Hannibal's jacket. The same someone has lain a senseless Heckyl out next to him like a sacrificial lamb, and then retreated. This sounds very like Hannibal, if he's being honest. So logically, Hannibal is safe and has come out on top in the confrontation, as is often the case. 

It's time to risk it and use his eyes. Will cracks them, grateful beyond measure for the half-closed drapes. Heckyl lies next to him, utterly immobile, and covered in blood. Some of it looks red, and some of it doesn't. Some of it doesn't even look natural, glittering weirdly turquoise where it catches the pale, diffuse light. Heckyl looks exhausted even in unconsciousness, dark circles ringing his closed eyes, his skin translucently pale. Will feels once again that odd pull of empathy in his chest. 

"You are a monster," he says, or tries to - it comes out croaky and half-swallowed, due to the clagged dryness of his throat. "You turned into a monster."

Heckyl does not, cannot, answer him. The bright blue of his neck tattoo seems to glow painfully like a fresh brand. In the back of Will's mind the spectre of an dark antlered man hangs back, watching with pale, inhuman eyes.  
 _Well, we're all monsters here._

Will painfully slowly begins to rise. Every little bit he pauses, lets his head adjust, like a diver coming up slowly to avoid the bends. His nose throbs, and he suspects that it's broken. But primarily he is an investigator. Time to investigate and work out what happened, so he can know what's going to happen next. 

Once he's made it to a sitting position, he can see that the doors and windows are closed and locked. Right. Definitely Hannibal. So Hannibal picked him up and brought him in here. He looks down, notices that the sleeve of the check jacket is pinned under Heckyl's outflung arm. Huh. So Hannibal brought Will in, covered him, then afterward went back out and deliberately fetched Heckyl, brought him back too and laid him down. 

_Why?_

Heckyl stirs slightly, moans in pain, and curls up around his knees in a fetal ball, but he does not wake.

"Hannibal didn't hurt you," Will says, aloud, with the confidence of long association with the doctor. "This is not how Hannibal hurts people." 

_Hannibal saved you._

Will rubs at his temples very carefully, avoiding the sticky clumps of bloodied hair. His headache does not abate. Nothing about today makes sense anymore. 

Very slowly, very warily, he uses the small javanese table to pull himself to his feet, and staggers slowly into the kitchen, wanting to splash some water in his face, take a drink, clear his senses.   
He doesn't make it to the sink. He's too busy staring at the brightly-clad corpse that's lying neatly on the marble-topped kitchen table. And - god help him - he can't stop himself. He bursts out laughing, a high, hysterical giggle that won't stop. It's all so  _stupid_. 

"This," Will tells the oblivious form of the dead Ranger, his voice cracking with laughter, " _this_  is how Hannibal hurts people."

Then he gets his drink, rubs a palmful of water into his eyes, and manages to stop laughing with an effort. Then, hearing a low cry of awakened fright and pain from the living room, he fills a second glass and goes in to check on his guest. 

Heckyl has not been so careful. Evidently he's less used to head injuries. He's clearly trying to make an escape, hide himself, anything to get away from where he is, but he's weak from loss of blood and exhaustion, and is lurching about wildly like a drunkard, bashing into furniture. 

"Hey," says Will, sharply, then, noting the disproportionate flinch of alarm, more gently, "Hey. Sit down. Sit!"

The tone of command he's more used to using on dogs gets through to Heckyl, who stops flailing about and sways dangerously on his feet. Will grabs his arm before he falls down and shoves him into the Queen Anne chair. There are lots of very important questions he needs to ask,  _where's Hannibal_  and  _what happened_ being pretty high up there, but what he actually says is, "Does it hurt you? When it happens?"

And it seems that Heckyl understands, because his expression changes from frightened to endlessly weary as he nods. 

"It hurts a  _lot_ ," he croaks, and Will hands him the water.   
He doesn't want to like him. He really doesn't. There's a lot Will blames him for. Things were okay here. It was beginning to feel like home, feel safe, although Will knows that Hannibal is never off guard. But alongside the need to blame there's that uncomfortable feeling of kinship that those who carry beasts beneath their skin cannot help but share. And Will's own empathy with killers, his blessing and his curse. Will watches Heckyl drink his water, watches the man's hands shake, and fights his instincts once again as they push him to take on Heckyl's patterns, ingrain Heckyl under his skin until he's no longer sure which are his thoughts and which belong to the other. He doesn't want the pendulum to swing, not for this man. He doesn't want to see what's inside, because he has a feeling the sheer scale of Heckyl's true age and pain will drive him mad with the impossibility of it all. 

_He turned into a monster._

And not just on the inside, in that strange shadowy world that Will and Hannibal share: half dream and half reality, where a feathered stag and a wendigo walk the twilight woods together. No. On the  _outside_. Heckyl had shifted shapes like a movie werewolf and become someone completely different. It is too hard to take in.   
So instead, Will pulls his focus in close to his own anger, and contemplates the fact that the red morph-suited idiot now lying dead in the kitchen had tried to kick his head off. 

 _Kids these days._  


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are moments so artistically perfect that time seems to stop, and one of them is the moment where Will Graham drops to the ground, the dark spray of his blood describing a perfect parabola in the air. There is so much beauty in the scene that it gives Hannibal pause: the perfect clarity of the sky, the reaching fingers of the tree branches, the slow arc of Will’s body as he falls.
> 
> It is a scene completely unbalanced by the neon ugliness of the Rangers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, so about that Ranger death...new chapter, with added gory details. Also, the reason Will finds it so easy to empathise with Heckyl. Also also, Hannibal is Hannibal, and he is very difficult to POV for.
> 
> Children's TV is very sanitised. Hannibal is not. I like the contrast.

There are moments so artistically perfect that time seems to stop, and one of them is the moment where Will Graham drops to the ground, the dark spray of his blood describing a perfect parabola in the air. There is so much beauty in the scene that it gives Hannibal pause: the perfect clarity of the sky, the reaching fingers of the tree branches, the slow arc of Will’s body as he falls.

It is a scene completely unbalanced by the neon ugliness of the Rangers.

Hannibal is not interested in the logistics of the situation. It matters little right here and now whether teenagers clad in rainbow suits who are linked to giant robot dinosaurs exist. It is of small consequence that the new patient has turned into a similarly improbable large robot, something which Hannibal observed with objectivity from behind the corner of the house.

 

What matters is that there is Will, and there are those who would hurt Will.

 

Hannibal moves deliberately, never wasting effort, never allowing any trace of emotion to alter his path. He has an aim. Things are either in the way of him achieving his aim, or they are not.

The creature evidently called Snide battles the Rangers. It is a powerful but chaotic fighter: no finesse, little strategy, lots of brute power. Such opponents are easy to defeat. Watching the combat, Hannibal is reminded of the samurai exhibition fights he witnessed in Tokyo. It is almost as if these opponents are not aiming to do real harm to each other. Both the bright Rangers and the hulking monster are putting on a good show, but it feels choreographed, oddly bloodless.

Except for Will. Will does not know the dance. He does not understand the places to dodge, the blows to pull. He is not part of this whole set-piece, he does not fit. So he suffers for it.

There he lies, blood on his face, the red-suited Ranger stood over him, their masked head tilted as if in confusion. Hannibal can read the youngster like a book, even without seeing his face. This isn’t how it works. People don’t lie there and bleed in their fights. People don’t really get hurt at all. Knock them down, they get back up, nobody bleeds, nobody really dies.

Except the monsters. And even they don’t die in blood and pain. 

Which is why the red Ranger doesn’t understand, doesn’t realise what is happening when Hannibal’s blade whispers up underneath his ribs. So sharp, so very sharp, so skilfully directed and so entirely dedicated to death. It is something entirely outside of a Power Ranger’s frame of reference. Hannibal hugs the teenager’s convulsing body to him, holds him close, head pressed to the shining helmet. He makes a low hissing sound, like the gentling call of a farmer working with cattle, and pulls the helmet free as the blood stains the red suit a darker shade. It falls to the ground and rolls. The face underneath is slack and open-mouthed in death.

There is abruptly silence from the battlefield as the other Rangers catch onto the fate of their comrade: the Blue and Black ones knock Snide backwards and then turn, staring, as Hannibal lowers the cooling meat slowly, dispassionately, and stares right back at them.

Their shock, disbelief and growing horror is like a tang of bitter scent on the air. They do not understand. And that is all right, Hannibal knows, because they do not need to. Their understanding, or lack of it, does not contribute to (or detract from) his aim, and therefore it is unimportant.

He turns his back on them, bends to where Will lies unconscious on the ground, and performs the basic checks every doctor would on an unresponsive patient.

He does not need to look behind him to know that the remaining Rangers have rushed him, in a furious, aggressive parody of their usual childish samurai dance, nor that the monster known as Snide has reared up like a rabid bear and placed himself between them, defending them. He can hear all these things, even as he feels Will‘s regular heartbeat beneath his fingers, smells the anxious, living sweat of Will‘s body.

He also hears the monster’s howl when it succumbs to the combined might of the remaining Rangers avenging their fallen friend: a howl that dwindles from metallic guttural roar into an all-too-human gasp of pain. It seems that the patient’s bestial form is not easy to maintain in times of stress.

 

Storing all these pieces of information away for future reference and consideration, Hannibal lifts Will, takes him inside their home where he may more easily be defended, then returns to the scene in their front garden. It is somewhat more dramatic than before. As if Hannibal’s action has broken some odd taboo they themselves were unaware of, the Rangers are now out for blood. They are no longer using their unusual, insipid style of martial arts, the one that pantomimes ferocity but has it not. They are acting now as instinctual, emotional creatures, out to protect their own lives and avenge the life that is gone. Hannibal is unsurprised. They are humans. This is what humans are like, clad in metaphysical dinosaurs or not. And humans are capable of so much they consider atrocity.

Heckyl rolls with the blows they deal him. His fingertips spark with electricity, like small fireworks - interesting, and Hannibal notes it - but he is already evidently exhausted and in great pain, and he is incapable of defending himself further. Like the Rangers, it seems he is not used to this being how these battles play out. The Pink one’s boot catches him across the temple and he slumps bonelessly into the dirt, senses fled. Just like Will.

And in common with Will, Hannibal has the shadow of a sense that Heckyl is more kin to them than perhaps any of them realise.

His aim shifts, focuses on the longer term now that Will is safe, and he moves forward. Toward the little group clustered around his new patient.

And against all sense, the Rangers retreat. They are many, and Hannibal is one. They should at least attempt to best him in combat, or call their dinosaurs forth as Heckyl had indicated they could. But no, it seems they are very susceptible to primal horror. They were not ready for blood or death and finding both has shaken them off their usual course. One, the Gold, makes as if to move towards the corpse, but is dissuaded by the solid and implacable form of Hannibal striding towards them - the adult moving to discipline the errant children. There is a small trickle of blood on his otherwise immaculate cuffs. The Rangers bunch together, pat shoulders and nod heads, then take off running back into the woods and are gone as suddenly as they arrived. After a few moments, the birds start to sing again, and the clearing around Will and Hannibal‘s house is peaceful once more, saving the presence of the blood and the corpse.

Hannibal does not pause in lifting Heckyl next. The man is lighter than Will, and given Will’s ability to starve himself if not reminded to eat, that is surprising. It is not gratitude for the measure of protection Snide’s assault on the Rangers had afforded him that moves Hannibal to rescue him: this is not something that Hannibal is moved by. Hannibal knows this is not over, and is taking steps to retain and protect the best source of information he has within reach. He is also, quite deliberately, placing the best weapon he has against the Rangers easily within Will’s reach for when he wakes. 

* * *

 

Standing now on the porch, with Heckyl hanging back inside the doorway, Will blinks slowly, his mind clearing as he returns to the present. The understanding, or for want of a better word, the vision of the events of the past hour fades away into memory.

“Hannibal,” he murmurs. Because his partner is still gone. He turns on Heckyl.

“Take me to where they will be,” he demands.

“Why?” is Heckyl’s response, full of posturing bravado. “You’ll kill me if I don’t? Or your husband will? Believe me, I’ve been threatened by more frightening people over the centuries. You’re also assuming I care what happens to either of you. I’ve got what I wanted. One dead Ranger is a great start.”

Will’s expression flattens, his eyes burning. “You’re lying,” he says, softly, and has the satisfaction of seeing Heckyl’s face twitch. Really, the man’s like a pantomime villain, his every emotion telegraphed in his face and body language. “You don’t really understand what’s happening either. You’re not used to winning and you‘re not used to them dying. You’re confused and you’re afraid and that thing, whatever it is, that thing inside you is eating you alive. You can’t hide that from me because I know what that’s like. I’ve been there. Do you remember everything that happens when he’s in control? Or do you lose a piece of time? Do you sometimes wake up and not know what you’ve done?” He takes an intimidating step toward the man. “Or do you remember it all but can’t change any of it?”

Heckyl’s expression is truly awful. It’s raw and ancient and vulnerable and a little bit crazy, and Will knows the same expression from his bathroom mirror in the encephalitis days. He can’t help the twinge of sympathy, but steels himself against it. He needs Heckyl, and he needs to be able to use him in the same way that Hannibal would. He doesn’t need to be held back by his empathy.

“You and I will have words,” he promises, “but first we find Hannibal.”

“Keeper,” Heckyl says, without hesitation. He still looks as if he’s about to throw up from the pain, but he’s functioning and his focus is now entirely on Will. “They’ll go to their mentor, there’s nowhere else.”

“Then that’s where we go,” says Will. He flicks his gaze over to the Ford Ranger parked by the broken-down lean-to. The irony of the name does not escape him. “Now get in the car.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “This,” says Will, in a tone of voice that brooks absolutely no shit, “is a museum. A dinosaur museum.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Smol update. :)

“This,” says Will, in a tone of voice that brooks absolutely no shit, “is a museum. A dinosaur museum.” Do people even make museums just for one thing anymore? He doubts it. It’s like something out of a children’s book.

Heckyl is silent in the seat next to him. They had spent most of the journey in silence: at least twice Heckyl had lapsed into some kind of pain-induced fugue state, and Will had almost envied him the peace. He’d flicked occasional glances at his unlikely ally during the drive, unable to stop himself.

The man is impossible on a number of levels. Something about him haunts Will, as surely as Garret Jacob Hobbs haunts him. Perhaps it is seeing the deep concern that Will has secretly harboured for a long time now finally made flesh: here is a creature whose dark side can rage across the physical world as well as the mental. If this is possible, then there remains the chance that Will’s own monster may one day consume him, body and all, with no control and no way back.

It is, after all, one thing to be a monster on the inside, and quite another to be one on the outside.

“Hey,” says Will, poking his travelling companion in the arm to get his attention. He doesn’t normally like touching other people, but he feels quite comfortable with touching other monsters. Heckyl jumps. His startle reflex is ridiculous. Will suspects he’s going into shock. “You’re sure this is the place?”

“Yes,” Heckyl says, in a small voice.

“You don’t sound sure.”

There’s a bit more silence, into which Will, being the perceptive little dickens that he is, reads an awful lot.

“You are sure,” he says, slowly, “but you don’t really know why. You’re not supposed to know about this place, are you?”

Heckyl shakes his head, very slightly. There’s a horrible confusion in his eyes.

“Because,“ Will expands, watching him carefully, “naturally, if you _knew_ where their secret base was, you’d’ve just marched in and let your bigger, badder self slaughter them all already, wouldn‘t you.”

The confusion in Heckyl’s expression grows: it’s a dark, creeping thing that Will doesn’t like in the least. He decides not to push it. Like Hannibal before him, he is rapidly coming to the conclusion that Hannibal’s intervention in this technicolor ninja world has thrown a lot of the usual rules out of the window - and neither the Rangers or Heckyl have any real idea how to cope with it. Heckyl is in _pain_. There are bruises blossoming on his face like ugly flowers, and he’s reacting like a child who’s just had their first grazed knee: incredulous, horrified and betrayed by a world that simply _wasn’t supposed to be this way_.

It’s in fact entirely possible (in Will’s considered opinion) that Heckyl will have some kind of panic attack if this violation of his perceived reality continues, and Will’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to have that on his conscience. He is, to his continuing concern, fighting off an overwhelming urge to try and comfort the man, and if _that_ isn’t seventy types of fucked-up he doesn’t know what is.

“Okay,” he says, softer now, as if speaking to one of his more nervous, more aggressive dogs. “Never mind. If this is where they are, this is where Hannibal will be.”

“He is…remarkable,” Heckyl says, flatly, and Will feels that glow of slightly unhealthy pride. Because of course, Hannibal is. “He protects you.”

Of course Hannibal does.

“That must be very nice for you both,” Heckyl concludes in a whisper, not able to look Will in the eyes, then he is out of the car and limping across the forecourt of the museum before Will can say anything in response. Probably for the best. Will has no idea what kind of comeback is appropriate for that. He’s starting to feel the same way as when he picked up Winston at the side of the road.

“We are _not_ adopting him, he is _not_ our problem,” he says out loud, trying to channel his inner Hannibal and gain some calm.

Once again, he fails. Muttering, he gets out of the car in his turn, follows the limping man, hoping against hell that he can find Hannibal before they have to kill too many objectionable teens. Murder, after all, should be an event, not a chore. Hannibal taught him that.

 

He’s never mentioning this to anyone ever again.

It’s not just the kiddie slide inside the mouth of the fibreglass dino. It’s not just the adorable little underground lair that looks like it escaped from a TV movie in the eighties and hasn’t stopped running since. It isn’t even the fact that there’s a short guy who looks like Yoda’s evil uncle hanging about in a Dungeon Master robe.

Actually, it’s pretty much all of those things rolled into one. And then Heckyl compounds the situation by turning out to be a wizard as well as a shape shifter.

He actually throws goddamn lightning from his fingertips and Uncle Yoda goes spinning across the room. There’s the sharp tang of ozone and smoke in the air and Will grabs hold of Heckyl, who is trembling again in every muscle but has his face twisted into a snarl of purely human malice.

“Stop that,” Will growls, and he’ll wonder afterwards how he didn’t get fried into a cannoli for just trying this. “We need to talk to him. Jesus. How can he talk if he’s dead?”

And unbelievably, Heckyl stops it. Backs up, lets Will take over, despite the fact that Will is a mere mortal who can’t hurl electricity or turn into a tank. Will isn’t sure how he feels about this at all, but having a shape shifting wizard submit to his every command can’t be a bad thing in this situation. He goes instead to the odd little figure in the robes, who is groaning and smoking slightly, and props his head up.

“You’re the one who controls those kids,” he says. “You need to get them to leave us alone or they will all die. That isn’t a threat. It’s just a fact. I wish it wasn‘t.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You know,” says Will, his exhaustion and anxiety filling his voice with bile, “I really don’t have time for this. Your trained goons are going to try and kill Hannibal and they are going to die, do you understand? Real death. Do you even know what that looks like? I do. I’ve already seen it happen once, and I don’t want to see it again. They’re just kids, for Christ’s sakes. I don’t want any of this. So I don’t want to hear anything about inevitability or destiny or any other such bullshit. All I want is for you and yours to leave us alone.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Culture shock is a terrible thing when your kid's show suddenly turns R rated. Oh, and Will is very tired of your crap. 
> 
> Also, this potential Heckyl/Will/Hannibal thing that seems to be breeding here is probably a symptom of just how much I need to reevaluate my life choices.

Heckyl’s head hurts unimaginably but at the moment this is as nothing as compared to the ugly, nauseous feeling that’s making his gut swim and his heart hammer.

The Red Ranger is dead. Not captured. Not banished. Dead and cold and lying on the cannibal’s table. There will be Ranger steaks for dinner. Probably done rare with some kind of elegant dressing. Heckyl bites back a giggle. His own body is reacting strangely: his wounds aren’t healing as fast as he's used to and he’s dizzy and sick, ears ringing. Is this a concussion, then? He knows the word, but its meaning had seemed a little irrelevant before. If he got knocked down, he got back up within hours, unscathed, even if the Megazord had trampled on him.

And the base. The Ranger base. This man Will is far too accurate. Because Heckyl _did_ know where it was, had led them right there without even thinking, because it was obvious. But he has no idea why this obvious knowledge is suddenly…there. Like he’d known it all along, but the world just wasn’t set up right for him to use what he knew.

He could have finished them all within days of getting free of Sledge, had the world been set up differently. Had the world been the way it is now. He trembles with both the thrill and the deep-seated horror of what this means.

Oh yes, Heckyl is very, very frightened by this switch in reality, and as Will is aware, the most dangerous animals are the frightened, wounded ones.

So he takes refuge in normality, acts up exactly as usual by slapping Keeper down with his power the minute they emerge into the base. He’s lashing out in the vain hope that things will go back to normal - but of course they don’t. The little alien takes the blow very hard, and Will intervenes. Heckyl lets himself be restrained because inside he is full of the screaming horrors and having somebody who actually seems to understand the new normal take control is rather a relief.

He likes someone else being in charge, if he’s honest, and this new insight into his own motivations is almost as disturbing as actually-dead Rangers on the kitchen table. Heckyl is the recognised big bad of several galaxies, even the worst monsters are afraid of him, and he’s been bonded to the Dark Energem. A demon called Snide owns half his soul. Lust for power is his reason for being and has been ever since Sentai 6: if you sliced him open he’d have “own the universe” written indelibly under his skin. He is so obvious a villain that you may as well paint a moustache on him and get ready for him to tie some innocent girls to the railway track.

But this human, this Will Graham…there’s something about him, some eerie centre of understanding and certainty, even when faced with a monster. Most people would probably think that being married to Hannibal the Cannibal would be an excellent trigger to develop such calm: but Heckyl is not most people, and he knows instinctively that Hannibal is not the cause of Will’s unique nature. It is the _other way about_. Will has drawn the monster to himself like a moth to a flame because he offers complete and unrelenting understanding. Comfort, even.

It disturbs Heckyl how much he wants that. He’d probably even kill for it.

 

“That isn’t a threat,” says Will, and he sounds both deadly serious and extremely tired. “It’s just a fact. I wish it wasn’t.”

“You are the one,” Keeper says, in his odd, croaky little voice. His huge dark eyes flick to Heckyl, who hangs back. “You. And the dark man you are with. I knew this day would come. Heckyl…I am not surprised that it is you who has brought this to pass. You always were smarter than the others.”

“What are you talking about?” Heckyl asks, and he’s pleased that he manages to keep almost all of the shakiness out of his voice. Almost.

“I only wish I could have prepared them better for what is to come,” Keeper murmurs, apparently to Will, who is frowning lightly as if faced with a particularly obtuse criminology student. “It was, after all, inevitable…the legends…”

And then Will does the thing that has Heckyl pretty much wanting to trail at his heels for life - he shifts his grip from supportive to aggressive in the blink of an eye and has Keeper rammed against the wall. Heckyl raises his eyebrows and feels he understands why this is the man who managed to reel in Dr Lecter. 

“You know,” says Will, his exhaustion and anxiety filling his voice with bile, “I really don’t have time for this. Your trained goons are going to try and kill Hannibal and they are going to die, do you understand? Real death. Do you even know what that looks like? I do. I’ve already seen it happen once, and I don’t want to see it again. They’re just kids, for Christ’s sakes. I don’t want any of this. So I don’t want to hear anything about inevitability or destiny or any other such bullshit. All I want is for you and yours to leave us alone.”

For some reason Heckyl doesn’t understand, Will chooses that point to glance at him, and that glance hits him as surely as a punch to the jaw. It could be blame. It could be anger.

It could be both of those things. But is it just possible it’s protective?

“We’re all monsters,” Will says, softly, turning his gaze back to Keeper. “Even you. Unless you stop this.”

Keeper blinks very slowly, in a lizard fashion, and then he nods.

“They will want to kill him too,” he says. “And they don’t know what that will do to them.” He stares hard at Heckyl. “But I fear _you_ do. Come. We will find them together. I only hope we are not too late.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Monsters should not look human. It’s a rule that got broken with Heckyl, who looks like one of their summer surf buddies who’s got really into playing with Victoriana, and has been mangled beyond recognition with Hannibal Lecter, who is every piece of artistic human culture wrapped up in a fine suit with fine manners. It isn’t right. Monsters look monstrous, humans look human. It is simple to spot the hero and the villain. This is how things should be.

Tyler is dead.

The Rangers move in formation, sticking to their routine in the same way as Heckyl to manage their shock and fright. They know the monster is behind them, and he’s not the monster they’re used to. There’s nothing plastic or Technicolor about him. The brightest colour on him is the red of Tyler’s blood across his cuffs.

Monsters should not look human. It’s a rule that got broken with Heckyl, who looks like one of their summer surf buddies who’s got really into playing with Victoriana, and has been mangled beyond recognition with Hannibal Lecter, who is every piece of artistic human culture wrapped up in a fine suit with fine manners. It isn’t right. Monsters look monstrous, humans look human. It is simple to spot the hero and the villain. This is how things should be.

Except that you grow up, and the monsters stop looking like cartoon characters and start looking like your friends, your neighbours, all the people you trust. The adults, the doctors. Black and white get all mixed up and you’re left with shades of grey which don’t help you manage your moral compass at all. 

And people who should have lived forever - who are young, and therefore immortal - start dying.

They stop running in a clearing a good few miles distant of that dreadful house, and de-morph. Koda is crying. In some ways he’s the most innocent of them all. Shelby comforts him, but her eyes are hard, showing a glimpse of the same steel that had driven her to kick the fallen Heckyl in the head so hard she probably cracked his skull. Chase and Riley are stony-faced, unable to react, because they don’t really believe what is happening.

And Ivan…Ivan comes out of the golden suit with a look on his face that says he understands the most out of all of them, and that he would have killed Heckyl with his bare hands had it not been for Hannibal, and the overwhelming shock.

The others look to him as the leader now, and Ivan nods briefly to each of them. He is knight and soldier now first of all, and there is no time for grief. He pats Koda’s arm once, in passing, and Koda rallies, scrubbing his arm across his eyes.

“What do we do?” Riley asks, and his voice sounds scratchy and awful. “Ivan.”

Ivan tilts his chin up, stalwart.

“We make monsters extinct,” he says.

“We don’t kill people, mate,” Chase objects, and he looks frightened.

“These aren’t people,” Shelby says. Everyone looks at her. “What? They’re not! You saw Heckyl, he turned into Snide. The tall man must have a monster form too. And the man with the glasses Tyler took down.”

“But…how can we be sure?”

This from Koda, who looks as if the only thing he wants to do is go back to bed and pretend today is a bad dream. His dark eyes are wide, still wet with tears.

“How we know who monsters and who…innocent?”

Nobody has an answer.

“I know at least one monster,” Ivan says, and he takes up stance before the group, coat flapping in the breeze. They form up behind him, following instincts they don’t know they have, making the most heroic aesthetic possible against the darkening sky. Against all odds, it looks like it’s going to rain. Rain, out of season. “Heckyl. We finish this today, take him out of action for good.”

Nobody adds the unspoken that’s written in Ivan’s every muscle: we kill him. We really kill him, in a way that involves blood and a corpse, not an explosion and an unfulfilling absence. We will write his blood across the ground because we have lost Tyler and morality is simple to the young. A life for a life.

If any of them find this idea unpalatable, they don’t show it. They’re ready to carry out justice.

“Power Rangers, hah!”

“It’s morphin’ time!”

Because perhaps it will be easier to kill, with their faces hidden behind masks and their sleek, colourful bodysuits all ready to soak up the blood.

They are so focused on their mission that they don’t notice that Hannibal Lector, with quite reptilian patience, is still following them, silent even across the roughest terrain.

 

 

Will is once again in the driving seat. It’s safest. He’s pretty sure that Heckyl doesn’t have a driver’s licence and there’s no way he’s letting ET back there have control of the car. Things are bad enough already without having anyone else catch sight of Keeper. Will’s pretty sure he doesn’t want to have any conversations with regular people about his current passengers. The current conversation he’s having is making no sense, anyway.

“You’re really serious,” he says, to Heckyl. Heckyl nods blankly.

“They all lock together and make a giant robot?”

Another nod.

“Like a Transformer?”

“I don’t…I don’t know what that is. All I know is, once they summon the zords, then I press a button and the monster grows to the size of a tower block. Then they fight.”

“And your monster loses.“

“Yes.“

Heckyl sounds like his head is getting worse. He has his face sunk into one gloved hand and is pressing long fingers against his sinus points.

“What, every time?”

“Every time.”

“And nobody cares about this? Giant monsters and robots slugging it out over the city pretty much once a month and it doesn’t make the papers? I’ve never seen anything about this and I’ve been living here for nearly a year!”

“I don’t know what to tell you.”

Will stares angrily out of the windshield as if the landscape whipping by has suddenly become a bright green moonscape. He frowns.

“You don’t know _Transformers_?”

“I’m not from around here,” says Heckyl, wearily. He leans his face against the window and closes his eyes, as if his forehead is hot and the cold glass feels good against his skin. He’s also sweating and shivering at the same time. Belatedly, Will realises that his companion probably has a concussion. And has never had one before in his weird PG-rated cartoon of a life where giant robots are perfectly normal but nobody so much as gets a paper cut during a fight. Shit.

“Hey. Hey!”

Will raises his eyes to the rearview mirror. “You back there. Keeper, right?”

“Yes, Will Graham.”

“Yeah, well, if you fancy doing some useful keeping, try and keep this guy awake. He’s taken a bad knock to the head and I need him, at least until we find Hannibal.” He very definitely isn’t thinking about what happens after that. The curse of having empathy.

“You are a good man,” says Keeper, in his gravelly, ancient voice.

“No,” says Will, with utter certainty. “No, I’m not. But I don’t kill kids indiscriminately.”

“And if they kill somebody,” Keeper says, shifting forward and pressing his stubby, scaly fingers to Heckyl’s neck, checking for a pulse, “they will no longer be the Rangers this Earth needs. Rangers do not kill, Mr Graham. They vanquish. They protect. But they must not kill. The Energems will be corrupted. It has happened before, with the Dark Energem. And my Rangers will fall into darkness. It has been predicted. There are legends - “

Will clamps his hands on the wheel so hard that his knuckles go white, and pays attention to the road as the rain abruptly hammers down out of a charcoal sky. He definitely doesn’t want to hear about the legends. Any legends. The stag in his head slinks into the shadows of his darker thoughts as if embarrassed to be there.

“We didn’t mean for any of this to happen,” he says, feeling oddly responsible.

Keeper says nothing: he merely leans forward properly as soon as they clear town, where the houses are fewer and further between. Certain they won’t be seen, the little alien gently shakes Heckyl awake. Christ, Will thinks, he looks even younger right now, blinking and wincing as he comes back to consciousness. No older than those spandex children out there. The windshield wipers carve back and forth in front of them, hypnotic and repetitive.

“If he looks like he’s going to throw up,” Will adds, “tell me. This is a new car.”


End file.
